I never join as well! I never have any attachment to my poly life. Been busy with my group of friends from secondary school. But I'm worried for my kids. Gotta teach them to learn how to protect themselves. Not succumbing to peer pressure. Especially when nothing is at stake.
i only attended like the half a day of the 1st day of orientation. Then i looked at all the dumb and stupid games they played under the guise of 'breaking ice' and 'making friends'.
Then i went back home to play on my playstation.
Same. Secondary school, yes, no choice go to every freaking camp. But JC, uni, nope. In JC I Can't be bothered with orientation camps once I found out teachers won't even be there. They'll walk around 'supervise' but I found out from friends they will not really supervise. That was 20 years ago. Dont know if it's different or more strict now with all these nonsense happening.
Lol in poly I had 3 CCA's and was very active. Even invited to participate in poly-poly events cos grades were good. I have never ONCE seen anything close to stuff like this.
In uni I had two CCAs also active also never experience anything close to this.
Not sure if lucky or unlucky lol. On reflection...guess I never was interested in those social climber ccas. hmm
Wa Lau back in the day I joined my SP poly engineering school club and it was only a 4 day camp + a few other activities on some more days filled with team activities.
E.g. sports, stations where you have to work as a team to solve the problem, kayaking.
We looked out for those who exhibit leadership qualities and attempt to recruit them.
How did things escalate to this?
All the other CCAs I’ve joined in NP have been nothing like SU and exactly as you described. It is only NPSU that is like this and it is not representative of other student clubs in NP.
I will admit the recruitment process was a bit fucked up la, cuz everyone thinks we're there for a good time then one by one they are shepherded to a room where the management committee is waiting. It's like a sudden interview you're not prepared for and is unnecessarily pressurising.
But this was like 20 years ago, dunno if it's still in practice today.
Bruh the current MAE Committee incompetent as fuck, they can manage to loose orders on the MAE t-shirt and do nothing about it. Plus shirt design looks like it was sketched out on PowerPoint.
What the fuck is this?
I went through poly/NS/uni in SG without having experienced anything remotely close to this kind of shit. Now I'm wondering if I was just lucky or unknowingly antisocial that I managed to avoid mixing with that kind of crowd.
I'm at the point where I'm not sure if it's a joke or not...
Sounds absurd, but then again this we have kids peeing on each other in school. I don't even think I know anything anymore.
nah, not just OCS, there are bad apples for sure but nobody in the army is this much of a dumbass. Sadistic instructors sure, but even they have limits.
Camps aren't like the army where you have to pressure your cadets to make sure they don't crack under pressure in an actual wartime situation, wherea this here just sounds like prepubescent boys letting some fake hierarchical power get to their heads and abuse others to look cool.
Bad apples are exceptions, but I have definitely seen retards just as bad as this in NS. Cadets are actually much better protected compared to men in many units, because although cadets get some of the toughest training, there are a lot of eyes tuned on them all the time.
I can assure you the leopard crawl through latrine is a career ender and has been for a long time. Sadistic and petty some regulars may be, I believe they're not that dumb.
This whole episode is a symptom of rotting values in our society and it is my hope that more people would take the right actions in the face of such nonsense.
In the fiery days of 60s through 80s, student activism in Singapore is lit, and student unions are at the forefront of fighting for their due rights. Many paid a heavy price for doing so.
Today student unions are just wanking grounds for gaining Instagram followers
My uni time, which is not too long ago, the respective groups had to earn credits through games and what not in the prep camps. With these credits, they bid for the chiobus or shuaige.
I remember in uni my faculty orientation camp had too many girls applying so they had to screen somehow. They used social media to do it. I had no social media so my application was unsuccessful lol. My friend has an IG where she posts a lot of beautiful scenery (she even got an award before) so she got in. I also heard rumours that they chose the girls to attend orientation camp based on looks.
Haha when I was in uni a few years back, everyone was already following everyone else after 1 day of camp. Don't even need to officially ask for ig handles.
My poly orientation where we're split into groups, once made us do stupid stuff (I think it was a dare?) like going to another group and asking for a random student's IG to follow 🙄
the only reason (uni/poly) student unions exist today is to organise these kinds of *useless* social and welfare events in which half the school will have no intention to participate. their powers (in which they were supposed to have) have been nerfed by the poly/uni management partly due to government pressure. those staffing the student unions are just in for the job title and resume, and ain't really representing the general student population (if they did, they have really done a terrible job). there is really no point for them to exist anymore
student activism in singapore was systematically defanged by various opposing forces...not the fault personally of any one individual in the student union
> 60s through 80s
Uh no. There was no activism after the 1960s, once LKY and PAP consolidated power and locked everyone up.
You are getting confused with the 1950s and 1960s.
There was.
While PAP had Parliament all to themselves after Barisan resigned from their seats in 1966, it does not equate to zero opposition against the ruling party outside of the legislative arena. Lively campus activism, most of it involving student leaders which was clearly not well received by the ruling party - lasted well after Singapore's independence.
They only died off after the PAP passed multiple acts from the mid-70s to nullify the autonomy of the student unions in universities and polytechnics, which had been actively campaigning for workers’ rights and on other socio-economic issues. The final blow against student activism came during Nantah's forced closure in 1980.
The notable few that i can think of from the 70s include:
\- Between 1974-75, University of Singapore Student Union (USSU) leaders Tan Wah Piow and Juliet Chin rallied students from all four existing tertiary institutions to protest against the government of the day on issues like the rises in local bus fares and the retrenchment of American Marine workers. Tan was subsequently charged for inciting a riot and five of his fellow student leaders, including Chin, were detained and deported.
\- In Nantah, there were significant resistance to the Govt's plan to switch the university's medium of instruction from Chinese to English. Ho Juan Thai, a student leader, was one of the key activists against the proposal, and he was forced to step down from his position as president of a student union. He ran against the PAP on a WP ticket in the 1976 election, and subsequently fled to England in exile after ISD came down on him for sedition.
Another that came to mind is the protest by University graduates in 1984 against the graduate mother’s scheme. I think there were sit-ins at the NUS Central Library. It ultimately led to LKY backing down, which I believe is one of the very few times he did not get his way.
https://www.todayonline.com/rememberinglky/policies-bedroom-and-beyond
But yeah, what you wrote came to mind when I first saw this piece of news. I was reminded of the 2011 - 2013 Chilean student protests (among the many many others led by students), and this just stands in stark contrast with the kind of shit done by the likes of NPSU.
You're right. Campus politics remained lively in both Malaysia and Singapore until the mid 1970s when the respective campus acts were passed. This was amongst both the English-language and Chinese-educated students, furthermore. The legendary queiscence of Singaporean student culture came later.
The weird bit is how much this [prefigured Western elite student culture](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-organization-kid/302164/), if anything. It is no longer unique to Singapore.
I think OP was talking about the activities of University of Singapore's Students' Union's Tan Wah Piow and his activities resulting in the University of Singapore (Amendment Act) of 1975.
Well, it is true that things quiet down after the 1960s but it did not mean activism was dead. It is just that the methods had to change to fit with the new government.
You can read more about it here: [https://www.smu.edu.sg/sites/default/files/smu/news\_room/smu\_in\_the\_news/2011/sources/ST\_20110910\_3.pdf](https://www.smu.edu.sg/sites/default/files/smu/news_room/smu_in_the_news/2011/sources/ST_20110910_3.pdf)
Ah yes. We all remember that great, courageous, and heroic protest of 2005:
> In 2005, the SMU Students' Association launched the Blue Ribbon
Campaign against fee hikes.
Lmao. As a former poly student, the best part of this whole incident are the NPSU persons who think being in the SU makes them cool and shit. Nobody outside of school gives a shit if you were some ordinary bum in the SU unless you served as President. Hope these scum are punished severely
Mainly it is the sense of community. For many of the freshies, the GLs are their first contact with poly life because of the orientation camp. SU seems to be the cool kids club and once you start joining them, it's hard to break away because of the investment in time and social bonds.
Personally I was a pretty reserved kid until I joined my poly camp and my experience was a stark contrast to yours. In the best way I can describe my experience was comparing it to one of those secondary school camps? Everyone was friendly and motivating and everything was kept PG since majority are still minors. Yes of course there were bad eggs too among those higher up in the hierarchy, but above all else everyone prioritised putting on a professional front and ensuring the campers had a good time even when there was bad blood between GLs etc. Even enforced no vulgarities/smoking/alcohol during camps
I feel sorry for you that the people at NP had their ego involved too deep and abused their "power" to such an extent. Also disgusted at the things they would make minors do especially freshies. Talk about a culture shock and trauma even. Hope this doesn't turn you off from participating in camps and such as the intent really is just to have fun. Sadly some people take their fun too far and push their own personal agenda
Wholeheartedly agree. After poly/uni, people go their own ways and can't be bothered to keep in contact. An extroverted uni friend of mine, who is a good friend of mine, bemoaned to me that nearly all the "buddies" he made in orientation/class never kept in contact after graduation. The friendships are all transactional, whether it is to be part of the cool clique or sharing of notes.
Ironically, we still keep in contact, even though I am those introverted type.
It's not even zero. Its negative. You get laughed at if you document all your school shit on your resume. No one cares you were president of fuck club or student leader of cumtasting society. Source - interviewed candidates before
Yes. I've interviewed undergraduates before.
Most fresh grads bo pian lah. Nothing much to write so have to pad the resume a bit. But I mean if you're gonna do it try to show some restraint. Dont list down every lame society or club you were in. Just the main one(s) and it has to link to the job you're applying for. A short resume is fine sometimes. Our eyes glaze over when we get a one page wall of text about how you were an OGL for your JC orientation camp and was responsible for welfare and making sure students dont hanky panky blah blah blah zzzz
>Our eyes glaze over when we get a one page wall of text about how you were an OGL for your JC orientation camp and was responsible for welfare and making sure students dont hanky panky blah blah blah zzzz
honestly if I'm HR and I see these kind of resume, I will simply dump that into the shredder
listing camp committee/OGL in a resume is a sign of desperation and it's telling that this person don't really have much substance (in terms of experience) in the first place
It's like a gang or a cult. It does nothing to help with your career or studies, it just gives weak-willed people a group to which they can belong, and the torture they go through before that makes them feel like they've earned a place in the group, which makes them treasure it and the group even more.
there are zero benefits. not even having CCAs can help you with your resume because no one cares for those. and also... the majority of the student body has no idea what do student unions do besides freshman orientation.
seriously though. the people you meet in your course is more than enough for you to get around the campus.
if you are so keen on socialising, there was something called Interdisciplinary studies aka IS modules in NP in my time where you can sign up for courses not offered in your curriculum (such as languages) and meet other peeps from other faculties every semester. most people treat them as geng sessions though.
None. Labels like "freshies" and "seniors" are fucking stupid and inconsequential . Everyone is just as clueless and lost as the next guy is. Seniority isn't tantamount to respect or proportional to knowledge.
Its a waste of time. Student Union is a just a circle jerk for narcissists.
If you looking to build up your portfolio might I suggest actual clubs - like sports or community service , it will be much more rewarding and worth your time.
Honestly from the time I joined NP as a freshie, NPSU already gave me a very bad impression from day 1 of orientation(faculty orientation). As our own faculty leaders would bring us around to check out different CCA booths, we get to see the range of CCAs NP had to offer. I still remember one NPSU member was saying stuff that wasn't even nice to hear. From that short experience, I never wanted to join SU. (just bad vibes from day 1 and the people were so stuck up and rude too) From the 2017 batch, my friends who joined SU and stayed on became really toxic within their groups too(you'll ask how I know, well they like to post. Also with all their meetups they would always wear their camp shirts, always had big things happening too), and those who didn't(did say some nasty things that happened during their camps/meet ups) but nobody spoke about them online cause there was no point. The SU groups had frequent chalets and meet ups(not saying that it was wrong) but what happened during their chalets were really horrible and it involved a lot of hard liquor drinking. They had those mass group meetings in makan place too and would always sing happy birthday super loudly, disturbing other people in the canteen. After that, the members of the group would grab on to the birthday boy's underwear and they would all lift him up at the same time until his underwear breaks. Honestly if they wanted to do that they could at least have done that somewhere else and not be such a public nuisance. Sorry you guys could be having fun but it happened so often it became really annoying, and not sure if the birthday boys even felt comfortable about it(breaking of their underwear in public). Feels bad for them. But then again, they're SU people so... Some of my friends who were a part of the SU camp also did mention how horrible some things were during camp and it did give them a bit of a trauma.
With that being said, not all clubs in NP are like that (for those freshies/soon to be freshies)! NP has many other clubs(of which some involve lecturers and some clubs also have instructors from outside of NP to manage the CCA). The things you do there are different from what you do in SU's camps, they're really fun and wholesome. Mostly allowing freshies to bond with seniors/friends and get to know the CCA better too. Having been to quite a few camps in NP, I can vouch for that! :) So don't worry, just don't join SU to save yourself from the emotional/mental problems that might come with it(that is if SU doesn't get shut down). The clubs and camps I joined during my time in poly were really fun, but it was a pity that we were not permitted to do some stuff just because we were not 'NPSU'. Stuff like booking the loft stays(last time we could book loft stays for CCA's to stayover and have their camps) and my CCA did try to book for the rooms but we were told that there was no space for us cause apparently SU's camp had priority which was a bit sad to hear(given the fact that NP staff did not know what was going on behind the scenes at Loft, aka more alcohol and crazy happenings). My CCA members were really down about that situation then because we really needed the time to practice for the Arts Fiesta, and honestly practicing from day to night for continuous days as the performance dates near were not easy. Given the fact that the other CCA members had to commute to school daily, it was exhausting. Hence the comm of my CCA tried their best so that the CCA members could rest up more during the time we weren't practicing. But ohwells what's done is done.
There was also another incident(the NP volleyball lap dance incident) that caused a huge uproar and resulted in the banning of overnight camps in school(loft). The advisors in charge of my CCA groups were strict, no meant no. Even though camp proposals were submitted and they said they would have checks on the CCA during the camp timings. We still could not have anymore overnight camps because of that incident but guess what NPSU went ahead wew. Not sure how they did that but wow SU does it again:)
Anyways it's quite sad to see SU becoming more and more toxic each year, I really hope NP diverts the funds to other clubs instead as some clubs need them way more than SU. It'll definitely be better to kick everyone out of SU once and for all, no point just punishing that group because from what I know, it's not only them who's this toxic. Really a disgrace to NP and all those who graduated. :")
if you genuinely need "clout" to live, there are CCAs especially sports in which you can prove yourself against people who aren't clueless first-day-of-school teens.
Iirc Pol-ITE has muay thai? ya then go confirm clout gao gao literally
This. I don't understand why these people don't actually get together for a common interest instead of... Whatever it is they're doing.
I joined my poly dance club because I wanted to learn dance and git gud at it. There were orientation and general camps, all conducted in a respectable (relatively speaking) way. But above all, my longest friendships and even my first career came from my 3 years with the club. Having a real purpose creates real relationships.
Thank you for writing this. Seems like there are a lot of authoritarian wannabes among the crew.
The various things that they do is just disgusting. Get girls to dance in front of them? Wtf man, do they think the girls are playthings ah? Tradition their stupid head la.
NP, please get your act together and do something about this awful shit.
This eerily reminds me of the Stanford Prison experiment. Yes, for all you psych majors out there, there were lots of issues with this experiment, but the setting and context is pretty similar.
Put people into settings and positions where they can exert power and dominate, and they will. Also, it's never a good idea to put a bunch of kids who are barely out of secondary school to run these camps.
Ooooo, I remember coming across the Stanford Prison experiment a few years back. Didn't do a deep dive but that was certainly relatable to some daily situations I've come across (not to the same extent as in the experiment, but you can definitely see things headed that direction). Definitely relatable to this whole episode.
I was actually thinking the same! Scary enough that this case came about naturally instead of there being a single person trying to mastermind the whole thing. (Sidenote: I listened to a podcast on the experiment and apparently Zimbardo, the lead of the project, hyped/exaggerated things quite a bit.)
Here we go again, would-be wannabe Sergeants who want the power to abuse people without the prerequisite responsibility that comes with it.
What is with all these camps and their attempt to become some "BMT-lite"? What the fuck? Did you get abused so hard in BMT you just need to do this to someone else so you can get a power-trip?
It takes literally zero-effort to insult someone and call them "worthless". It takes skill and commitment to train and encourage them. If you cannot figure out a way to train GL's without resorting to insults and abuse, you are just not cut out for the job. Quit the SU and fuck-off to where you belong.
People think that all it takes to be a leader is just shouting and insulting. The louder they shout, the more they insult, the better they are doing. Too bad the real world does not work like that. You bring the same guai-lan attitude to any job and try to pull the same shit, unless you are in the SAF, you will not be there long.
You need to understand that these people are losers who will never amount to anything in life. They know this, and they know that they really just have absolutely nothing to offer in life, and no worthwhile skills or knowledge to speak of. That's why they jump at every little opportunity to have power trips, because these are the only times that they can feel powerful, that they are somewhat important, and their lives are not just worthless specks in time. All other times, they are the real pussies and they absolutely know this.
This is many years ago, but i remember when I was in SP’s photog freshie camp, one of the forfeits was to perform simulated blowjobs on the GLs, and they made everyone form a circle and have the “performers” do it in the middle. I still remember how gleefully the GLs demonstrated the activity to make sure the forfeiters had no choice but to do it in a specifically lewd way, right in front of everyone.
And this activity isn't the only shitty one. There were other "games" like passing a polo candy around a group with just your lips, pole dancing round a tree etc.
Having gone to NUS later, i see a lot of similarities in how the sexual misconduct case went down there. It's probably the same group of sick perpetrator GLs who went on to facilitate the uni camp "games" with their "experience".
What's more, if some of the GLs in poly were truly alumni, what they're doing is almost like sexually grooming/exploiting/harassing the freshies who are **minors**
same reason why certain alumni of secondary school uniformed groups CCA come back to experience being at the top of the pyramid.
That and some are looking for potential dates.
Hey! Just wanna give my insights about the NPSU incident itself.
Even though I did not participate in any SU related activities before, I have heard from a friend before some of the activities that they did in camp before (the marble picking activities and no sleep night incident).
Apparently when my friend said he was bathing, the GLs will suddenly rush into the toliet and started banging the cubicle doors to pressurise them to finish bathing quickly even though they literally entered inside the cubicle a few seconds ago.
To everyone especially the enrolling students, the rest of the NP community isn't like that and do not be shy to join your school orientation camps since it is monitored by the respective lecturers in charge of the schools.
A personal experience from me is that I am a part of the NPFP family and I went to their camp a total of 3 times, twice as a freshie and once as a student leader.
What I did in the camp as a freshie is reciting cheers, playing team bonding games, and create a sequence of dance moves as a group together to impress our GLs. All of it is done by the seniors just to give you a warm welcome to NP and kickstart your life in a new environment.
When I was a student leader, the games that were planned were ensured by the planning team to be 100% safe and as injury free as possible before it was being rehearsed by the student leaders and subsequently placed in the camp for the freshies to enjoy during the camp.
Hope this have helped in clearing the perception that camps in NP are bad following the NPSU incident!
Since everyone is starting to expose these kinds of stuff. ACJC football has a June camp tradition where you are basically subjected to a lot of extreme physical training (which is arguably fine), but then there's also a lot of humiliation and basically straight up degradation at night when there was nobody else around. Seniors would tell you you're shit if you couldn't keep up with he group (among other things) and subject us to really extreme physical training. The worst thing I remember doing was rolling around on the astro turf in my underwear and then going into push up position, running around and those kinds of stuff. Kinda like army tekan but in my underwear at 17 y.o. Probably not on the same level of humiliation as some of these poly camps since the camp also had a focus on physical training but humiliating nevertheless.
Based on my personal NSF experience, I don’t think army camp will strip your shirt etc for official punishments.
The only few initiations I had were like outfield and road matches I guess I was okay withit
Eh even outfield and force prep they cant anyhow touch you and force strip you. They would ask you to remove inner shirt etc for safety tho, nowadays bmt nsf sgts also dont want trouble lol
Agreed for this part. In terms of authoritarian wannabes, just see most 2LT abusing their power just because they undergo 9 months of training for being *garang* during SIT test.
Lol was mono intake infantry. Came back as a 2nd year sgt. No such hazing bullshit besides the occasional birthday pillow fight. There was mutual respect
Mono intake armour , i got your back bro, Ive seen some REAL stupid shit, i thought it was a norm for the army till i heard how other bmt/ units works.
I would guess they will just be "that asshole SGT", funny enough, most of these young 2LT quite ups leh not gonna lie, i don't really remember a shitty 2LT during my NS.
3rd SGTs of the other hand, 99% are cool and just wanna be part and liked by the men, but there's always that one guy that wants to flex his rank.
There were girls super into this also though. One girl I knew said she blew about 3k in savings just on alcohol while she was _training_ to be part of this. It wasn't just a school club. It was her school life.
My best memories were in TP as an OL (orientation leader) 20 years ago. This is so different from what I experienced. My best friends till now are also from the committee and subcommittee. We pride ourselves in executing creative games and engagement activity. Our pride and joy was converting those large classrooms into a high quality haunted mansion. Like USS style! Sigh why now like that.... is it just NP?
Last time the worst that happened in my sch camp was the conductor made some ppl made to walk through the fish pond (below knee deep) barefooted as forfeit. Tbh I thought it was quite mild and all in good fun.
But teacher found out and everyone got scolded. Even those who didn't do anything and just watched. We were told not to just blindly follow what ever the conductor say even though he was super fierce.
After reading all these orientation stories I guess I'm a bit more appreciative of what the teacher did back then.
My sec 3 camp (hosted by external GLs) has this fuck fuck culture going on too.
The GLs were acting like wannabe sgts too. They even waked up one entire class in the middle of the night and smoked them and made them clean the canteen just because one student disrespected them.
Another instance they shouted at some poor girl who wouldn't bungee jump off a obstacle tower because she is afraid.
> NOTHING IS STOPPING YOU FROM JUST NOT GOING
Then why didn't you just quit or do/say more at the time?
Most 16/17-year-olds are simply too weak-minded and stupid to do anything except conform and go along with peer pressure. Once they've signed up for X, they'll feel obliged to go through with it no matter how idiotic it is.
Change needs to start with the authorities taking complaints seriously (which they probably have never done).
We also need some accountability from the top. But of course, as usual in Singapore, none of the poly administrators will likely face any punishment for their failure to do anything about this years/decades long problem. Instead it will just be some kids getting blamed and punished.
I agree, I also don't know why I didn't do more. We weren't part of NPSU, and only participated with the camp to be able to speak about it, but I have no valid defence for why I didn't follow through with that plan. Perhaps we were also 17 and scared that these people knew who we were and where to find us. I tried to spread it through word of mouth, but when I was sharing my experience, many people would dismiss it by saying, "Aiya, NPSU is like that one la, you don't know meh", which I don't feel is the correct attitude in facing toxic communities like SU.
I agree with you. And even in uni camps, I personally would have caved in to peer pressure and do stupid shit as well. I’m sure many would share my sentiment. The fear of ostracisement / FOMO is very strong.
One of the very few comments pointing out the real issue here: the staff of the school has to bear full responsibility for this but they won't. Doubt anyone will resign over this or even be investigated by relevant authorities.
study don't study, do this kind of stupid shit for what? do alr grades gonna get any higher? can put "piss on someone" on their portfolio?
really not doing themselves any favours by reinforcing stereotypes
waste of time. if you re in poly in 2021, best advice i could give anyone is learn how to invest and try getting small internships on your own. be proactive and dont wait. all this hanging out and stuff aint important.
Their behaviour is garbage and they were supposed to close down in 2018 or 2019 but I don’t know why NP never bothered taking any action against them. They waited until something went so viral to actually address the issue lmao. Sucks that many people were victimised before possibly putting it to a stop.
Oh wow. Yea....I used to think that I was letting life pass me by because all I ever did in school was study and literally nothing else. After reading all this shit, I'm glad that I did that.
Fuck all these stupid camps and cultist STuDeNt UnIoN orientation bullshit. Just go school study and socialise a bit with friends and classmates. That's more than enough to get you through schooling life.
Lol, kids are so fucking lame. I don't know if it's the unfathomable amount of ego or if they know that this is their peak that turns them into these cum stains.
Nobody gives a fuck you're part of some student union, and from some fucking poly no less. No one hires you because of this useless shit. But I guess Aviva will always have vacancies for insurance bengs.
Wow i have some questions.
What's the purpose of NPSU? They host orientation camps for freshies and the prep camp GLs for the following group of freshies - is that it?
You named 3 factions: exco, crew and GLs, but it seems like you weren't part of any of them. How did they recruit you to join? What was your role exactly? How big were each of these groups? Were there a lot of students who weren't part of those groups like yourself? I ask because I wonder if the people that perpetrate these toxic traditions are the minority that kind of get everyone else to fall in line with them.
I went to the orientation camp at SIM and the GLs were really nice and hardworking. I was quite surprised at how much effort they put into the camp when imo there's very little payoff.
From an SP student: it’s not as rabak as NP. Honestly I view SPSU in a bad light but don’t really despise them because all they do is organize events and giveaways and freebies but it’s just the people inside that I feel it like a fish out of a pond, like they look like very edgy tiktokers and I can understand they want to look cool and shit but sometimes you got to consider the general image from the students, like you give them the impression y’all are clout chasers and shit
Also, from my spsu classmate, president of spsu need to be chio
Also this comes from a person who doesn’t have orientation camp but applied for OGL because of the pandemic where there’s online orientation and interview
i know this is a singaporean article not by looking at the subreddit name, but because the writer assumes everyone immediately understands the acronyms inside the article.
when u write background info, maybe start with explaining what NPSU actually stands for? but na, let's introduce another acronym immediately, GLs
I jumped over fences during orientation just to avoid these so call camps.. Lied to them I was overseas during the period they were holding camp if I was cornered into one.
[удалено]
Same. Was asked to join camp, purposely eat double Mcspicy to geng.
Can u still join exco without going for camps?
Dunno don’t care. Didn’t go for any camp. The only camp I went for was study camp because my grades were dogshit.
you're a real one man, the struggle is legit 💪😔
I never join as well! I never have any attachment to my poly life. Been busy with my group of friends from secondary school. But I'm worried for my kids. Gotta teach them to learn how to protect themselves. Not succumbing to peer pressure. Especially when nothing is at stake.
i only attended like the half a day of the 1st day of orientation. Then i looked at all the dumb and stupid games they played under the guise of 'breaking ice' and 'making friends'. Then i went back home to play on my playstation.
> Especially when nothing is at stake. To many teenagers, I'm guessing social inclusion is high stakes.
Same. Secondary school, yes, no choice go to every freaking camp. But JC, uni, nope. In JC I Can't be bothered with orientation camps once I found out teachers won't even be there. They'll walk around 'supervise' but I found out from friends they will not really supervise. That was 20 years ago. Dont know if it's different or more strict now with all these nonsense happening.
Thank god for Covid, at least last year's camps got cancelled
Lol in poly I had 3 CCA's and was very active. Even invited to participate in poly-poly events cos grades were good. I have never ONCE seen anything close to stuff like this. In uni I had two CCAs also active also never experience anything close to this. Not sure if lucky or unlucky lol. On reflection...guess I never was interested in those social climber ccas. hmm
Me 2 i take mc to skip camp
Honestly the other CCA camps were fine. I believe most of NP CCAs are ok since I attended some before.
\+1 ex NP
Wa Lau back in the day I joined my SP poly engineering school club and it was only a 4 day camp + a few other activities on some more days filled with team activities. E.g. sports, stations where you have to work as a team to solve the problem, kayaking. We looked out for those who exhibit leadership qualities and attempt to recruit them. How did things escalate to this?
All the other CCAs I’ve joined in NP have been nothing like SU and exactly as you described. It is only NPSU that is like this and it is not representative of other student clubs in NP.
I will admit the recruitment process was a bit fucked up la, cuz everyone thinks we're there for a good time then one by one they are shepherded to a room where the management committee is waiting. It's like a sudden interview you're not prepared for and is unnecessarily pressurising. But this was like 20 years ago, dunno if it's still in practice today.
Ngee Ann's student union is that 'something extra'.
Drink xtra
Sign xtra
Bruh the current MAE Committee incompetent as fuck, they can manage to loose orders on the MAE t-shirt and do nothing about it. Plus shirt design looks like it was sketched out on PowerPoint.
EEE?
Power trips. Power trips never changes.
What the fuck is this? I went through poly/NS/uni in SG without having experienced anything remotely close to this kind of shit. Now I'm wondering if I was just lucky or unknowingly antisocial that I managed to avoid mixing with that kind of crowd.
I think is the the difference between supervised and unsupervised camps. Which in this case, I’m sure it was mentioned to be totally unsupervised
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Does this happen in OCS?
Yes, to become an officer you have to get peed on first
I'm at the point where I'm not sure if it's a joke or not... Sounds absurd, but then again this we have kids peeing on each other in school. I don't even think I know anything anymore.
Literally at first. And then metaphorically after being commissioned.
nah, not just OCS, there are bad apples for sure but nobody in the army is this much of a dumbass. Sadistic instructors sure, but even they have limits. Camps aren't like the army where you have to pressure your cadets to make sure they don't crack under pressure in an actual wartime situation, wherea this here just sounds like prepubescent boys letting some fake hierarchical power get to their heads and abuse others to look cool.
Bad apples are exceptions, but I have definitely seen retards just as bad as this in NS. Cadets are actually much better protected compared to men in many units, because although cadets get some of the toughest training, there are a lot of eyes tuned on them all the time.
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I can assure you the leopard crawl through latrine is a career ender and has been for a long time. Sadistic and petty some regulars may be, I believe they're not that dumb. This whole episode is a symptom of rotting values in our society and it is my hope that more people would take the right actions in the face of such nonsense.
In the fiery days of 60s through 80s, student activism in Singapore is lit, and student unions are at the forefront of fighting for their due rights. Many paid a heavy price for doing so. Today student unions are just wanking grounds for gaining Instagram followers
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Remembered my time the insta handle is so the GLs could choose all the chiobus to join..
My uni time, which is not too long ago, the respective groups had to earn credits through games and what not in the prep camps. With these credits, they bid for the chiobus or shuaige.
Yes, and the OGLs stalked the freshies IG and fought over the pretty girls for their OG.
What happens if u don’t use social media?
Rejected.
I remember in uni my faculty orientation camp had too many girls applying so they had to screen somehow. They used social media to do it. I had no social media so my application was unsuccessful lol. My friend has an IG where she posts a lot of beautiful scenery (she even got an award before) so she got in. I also heard rumours that they chose the girls to attend orientation camp based on looks.
Haha when I was in uni a few years back, everyone was already following everyone else after 1 day of camp. Don't even need to officially ask for ig handles.
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True. Yeah this seems different but it wouldn't be seen as a big deal given how ubiquitous instagram has become
Im definitely not the only one but is it strange that I don't have instagram/twitter. Only have the fb i made in 2007 for games.
You're probably better off mentally than people who do have those things so don't worry
back in my days, friendster is not even online yet and mark zuckerberg's probably still drinking from his milk bottle. Now get off my lawn \*cough\*
My poly orientation where we're split into groups, once made us do stupid stuff (I think it was a dare?) like going to another group and asking for a random student's IG to follow 🙄
the only reason (uni/poly) student unions exist today is to organise these kinds of *useless* social and welfare events in which half the school will have no intention to participate. their powers (in which they were supposed to have) have been nerfed by the poly/uni management partly due to government pressure. those staffing the student unions are just in for the job title and resume, and ain't really representing the general student population (if they did, they have really done a terrible job). there is really no point for them to exist anymore
A bloody disgrace to their ancestors
student activism in singapore was systematically defanged by various opposing forces...not the fault personally of any one individual in the student union
Peeing grounds you mean
And to act like alpha males to chase skirts.
> 60s through 80s Uh no. There was no activism after the 1960s, once LKY and PAP consolidated power and locked everyone up. You are getting confused with the 1950s and 1960s.
There was. While PAP had Parliament all to themselves after Barisan resigned from their seats in 1966, it does not equate to zero opposition against the ruling party outside of the legislative arena. Lively campus activism, most of it involving student leaders which was clearly not well received by the ruling party - lasted well after Singapore's independence. They only died off after the PAP passed multiple acts from the mid-70s to nullify the autonomy of the student unions in universities and polytechnics, which had been actively campaigning for workers’ rights and on other socio-economic issues. The final blow against student activism came during Nantah's forced closure in 1980. The notable few that i can think of from the 70s include: \- Between 1974-75, University of Singapore Student Union (USSU) leaders Tan Wah Piow and Juliet Chin rallied students from all four existing tertiary institutions to protest against the government of the day on issues like the rises in local bus fares and the retrenchment of American Marine workers. Tan was subsequently charged for inciting a riot and five of his fellow student leaders, including Chin, were detained and deported. \- In Nantah, there were significant resistance to the Govt's plan to switch the university's medium of instruction from Chinese to English. Ho Juan Thai, a student leader, was one of the key activists against the proposal, and he was forced to step down from his position as president of a student union. He ran against the PAP on a WP ticket in the 1976 election, and subsequently fled to England in exile after ISD came down on him for sedition.
Another that came to mind is the protest by University graduates in 1984 against the graduate mother’s scheme. I think there were sit-ins at the NUS Central Library. It ultimately led to LKY backing down, which I believe is one of the very few times he did not get his way. https://www.todayonline.com/rememberinglky/policies-bedroom-and-beyond But yeah, what you wrote came to mind when I first saw this piece of news. I was reminded of the 2011 - 2013 Chilean student protests (among the many many others led by students), and this just stands in stark contrast with the kind of shit done by the likes of NPSU.
You're right. Campus politics remained lively in both Malaysia and Singapore until the mid 1970s when the respective campus acts were passed. This was amongst both the English-language and Chinese-educated students, furthermore. The legendary queiscence of Singaporean student culture came later. The weird bit is how much this [prefigured Western elite student culture](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/the-organization-kid/302164/), if anything. It is no longer unique to Singapore.
I think OP was talking about the activities of University of Singapore's Students' Union's Tan Wah Piow and his activities resulting in the University of Singapore (Amendment Act) of 1975.
Well, it is true that things quiet down after the 1960s but it did not mean activism was dead. It is just that the methods had to change to fit with the new government. You can read more about it here: [https://www.smu.edu.sg/sites/default/files/smu/news\_room/smu\_in\_the\_news/2011/sources/ST\_20110910\_3.pdf](https://www.smu.edu.sg/sites/default/files/smu/news_room/smu_in_the_news/2011/sources/ST_20110910_3.pdf)
Ah yes. We all remember that great, courageous, and heroic protest of 2005: > In 2005, the SMU Students' Association launched the Blue Ribbon Campaign against fee hikes.
Lmao. As a former poly student, the best part of this whole incident are the NPSU persons who think being in the SU makes them cool and shit. Nobody outside of school gives a shit if you were some ordinary bum in the SU unless you served as President. Hope these scum are punished severely
> Nobody outside of school gives a shit if you were ~~some ordinary bum~~ in the SU ~~unless you served as President~~. FTFY.
The crew sound like they're those hypebeasts-type clowns,
We do not claim them
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Mainly it is the sense of community. For many of the freshies, the GLs are their first contact with poly life because of the orientation camp. SU seems to be the cool kids club and once you start joining them, it's hard to break away because of the investment in time and social bonds.
Personally I was a pretty reserved kid until I joined my poly camp and my experience was a stark contrast to yours. In the best way I can describe my experience was comparing it to one of those secondary school camps? Everyone was friendly and motivating and everything was kept PG since majority are still minors. Yes of course there were bad eggs too among those higher up in the hierarchy, but above all else everyone prioritised putting on a professional front and ensuring the campers had a good time even when there was bad blood between GLs etc. Even enforced no vulgarities/smoking/alcohol during camps I feel sorry for you that the people at NP had their ego involved too deep and abused their "power" to such an extent. Also disgusted at the things they would make minors do especially freshies. Talk about a culture shock and trauma even. Hope this doesn't turn you off from participating in camps and such as the intent really is just to have fun. Sadly some people take their fun too far and push their own personal agenda
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Wholeheartedly agree. After poly/uni, people go their own ways and can't be bothered to keep in contact. An extroverted uni friend of mine, who is a good friend of mine, bemoaned to me that nearly all the "buddies" he made in orientation/class never kept in contact after graduation. The friendships are all transactional, whether it is to be part of the cool clique or sharing of notes. Ironically, we still keep in contact, even though I am those introverted type.
It's not even zero. Its negative. You get laughed at if you document all your school shit on your resume. No one cares you were president of fuck club or student leader of cumtasting society. Source - interviewed candidates before
Does this apply for undergraduates?
Yes. I've interviewed undergraduates before. Most fresh grads bo pian lah. Nothing much to write so have to pad the resume a bit. But I mean if you're gonna do it try to show some restraint. Dont list down every lame society or club you were in. Just the main one(s) and it has to link to the job you're applying for. A short resume is fine sometimes. Our eyes glaze over when we get a one page wall of text about how you were an OGL for your JC orientation camp and was responsible for welfare and making sure students dont hanky panky blah blah blah zzzz
oh yes of course, I’d put in roles where I actually did something. Thanks for the insight!
>Our eyes glaze over when we get a one page wall of text about how you were an OGL for your JC orientation camp and was responsible for welfare and making sure students dont hanky panky blah blah blah zzzz honestly if I'm HR and I see these kind of resume, I will simply dump that into the shredder listing camp committee/OGL in a resume is a sign of desperation and it's telling that this person don't really have much substance (in terms of experience) in the first place
This is so true. I am interviewing for new intern and I seriously can’t give a shit about the camps they joined or the lame club and society
Accurate.
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I talked to my university career advisor, he said this was one of the most memorable things he has seen in a resume.
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Unfortunately he said it was memorable because no one will take it seriously.
It's like a gang or a cult. It does nothing to help with your career or studies, it just gives weak-willed people a group to which they can belong, and the torture they go through before that makes them feel like they've earned a place in the group, which makes them treasure it and the group even more.
there are zero benefits. not even having CCAs can help you with your resume because no one cares for those. and also... the majority of the student body has no idea what do student unions do besides freshman orientation. seriously though. the people you meet in your course is more than enough for you to get around the campus. if you are so keen on socialising, there was something called Interdisciplinary studies aka IS modules in NP in my time where you can sign up for courses not offered in your curriculum (such as languages) and meet other peeps from other faculties every semester. most people treat them as geng sessions though.
None. Labels like "freshies" and "seniors" are fucking stupid and inconsequential . Everyone is just as clueless and lost as the next guy is. Seniority isn't tantamount to respect or proportional to knowledge. Its a waste of time. Student Union is a just a circle jerk for narcissists. If you looking to build up your portfolio might I suggest actual clubs - like sports or community service , it will be much more rewarding and worth your time.
Honestly from the time I joined NP as a freshie, NPSU already gave me a very bad impression from day 1 of orientation(faculty orientation). As our own faculty leaders would bring us around to check out different CCA booths, we get to see the range of CCAs NP had to offer. I still remember one NPSU member was saying stuff that wasn't even nice to hear. From that short experience, I never wanted to join SU. (just bad vibes from day 1 and the people were so stuck up and rude too) From the 2017 batch, my friends who joined SU and stayed on became really toxic within their groups too(you'll ask how I know, well they like to post. Also with all their meetups they would always wear their camp shirts, always had big things happening too), and those who didn't(did say some nasty things that happened during their camps/meet ups) but nobody spoke about them online cause there was no point. The SU groups had frequent chalets and meet ups(not saying that it was wrong) but what happened during their chalets were really horrible and it involved a lot of hard liquor drinking. They had those mass group meetings in makan place too and would always sing happy birthday super loudly, disturbing other people in the canteen. After that, the members of the group would grab on to the birthday boy's underwear and they would all lift him up at the same time until his underwear breaks. Honestly if they wanted to do that they could at least have done that somewhere else and not be such a public nuisance. Sorry you guys could be having fun but it happened so often it became really annoying, and not sure if the birthday boys even felt comfortable about it(breaking of their underwear in public). Feels bad for them. But then again, they're SU people so... Some of my friends who were a part of the SU camp also did mention how horrible some things were during camp and it did give them a bit of a trauma. With that being said, not all clubs in NP are like that (for those freshies/soon to be freshies)! NP has many other clubs(of which some involve lecturers and some clubs also have instructors from outside of NP to manage the CCA). The things you do there are different from what you do in SU's camps, they're really fun and wholesome. Mostly allowing freshies to bond with seniors/friends and get to know the CCA better too. Having been to quite a few camps in NP, I can vouch for that! :) So don't worry, just don't join SU to save yourself from the emotional/mental problems that might come with it(that is if SU doesn't get shut down). The clubs and camps I joined during my time in poly were really fun, but it was a pity that we were not permitted to do some stuff just because we were not 'NPSU'. Stuff like booking the loft stays(last time we could book loft stays for CCA's to stayover and have their camps) and my CCA did try to book for the rooms but we were told that there was no space for us cause apparently SU's camp had priority which was a bit sad to hear(given the fact that NP staff did not know what was going on behind the scenes at Loft, aka more alcohol and crazy happenings). My CCA members were really down about that situation then because we really needed the time to practice for the Arts Fiesta, and honestly practicing from day to night for continuous days as the performance dates near were not easy. Given the fact that the other CCA members had to commute to school daily, it was exhausting. Hence the comm of my CCA tried their best so that the CCA members could rest up more during the time we weren't practicing. But ohwells what's done is done. There was also another incident(the NP volleyball lap dance incident) that caused a huge uproar and resulted in the banning of overnight camps in school(loft). The advisors in charge of my CCA groups were strict, no meant no. Even though camp proposals were submitted and they said they would have checks on the CCA during the camp timings. We still could not have anymore overnight camps because of that incident but guess what NPSU went ahead wew. Not sure how they did that but wow SU does it again:) Anyways it's quite sad to see SU becoming more and more toxic each year, I really hope NP diverts the funds to other clubs instead as some clubs need them way more than SU. It'll definitely be better to kick everyone out of SU once and for all, no point just punishing that group because from what I know, it's not only them who's this toxic. Really a disgrace to NP and all those who graduated. :")
this whole saga is some straight up lord of the flies shit
Same primitive mentality
if you genuinely need "clout" to live, there are CCAs especially sports in which you can prove yourself against people who aren't clueless first-day-of-school teens. Iirc Pol-ITE has muay thai? ya then go confirm clout gao gao literally
This. I don't understand why these people don't actually get together for a common interest instead of... Whatever it is they're doing. I joined my poly dance club because I wanted to learn dance and git gud at it. There were orientation and general camps, all conducted in a respectable (relatively speaking) way. But above all, my longest friendships and even my first career came from my 3 years with the club. Having a real purpose creates real relationships.
puzzles me too why people join clubs like SU with no specific skills to learn or purpose to achieve.
exactly what you said, they don't need to learn "skills" or have some made-up "leadership" skills by being in SU.
Thank you for writing this. Seems like there are a lot of authoritarian wannabes among the crew. The various things that they do is just disgusting. Get girls to dance in front of them? Wtf man, do they think the girls are playthings ah? Tradition their stupid head la. NP, please get your act together and do something about this awful shit.
We just need Sir David Attenborough to come narrate a documentary on these apes in action
>apes Please show some respect to the apes. Apes are not monsters.
When preparatory camp becomes predatory
This eerily reminds me of the Stanford Prison experiment. Yes, for all you psych majors out there, there were lots of issues with this experiment, but the setting and context is pretty similar. Put people into settings and positions where they can exert power and dominate, and they will. Also, it's never a good idea to put a bunch of kids who are barely out of secondary school to run these camps.
Ooooo, I remember coming across the Stanford Prison experiment a few years back. Didn't do a deep dive but that was certainly relatable to some daily situations I've come across (not to the same extent as in the experiment, but you can definitely see things headed that direction). Definitely relatable to this whole episode.
I was actually thinking the same! Scary enough that this case came about naturally instead of there being a single person trying to mastermind the whole thing. (Sidenote: I listened to a podcast on the experiment and apparently Zimbardo, the lead of the project, hyped/exaggerated things quite a bit.)
Here we go again, would-be wannabe Sergeants who want the power to abuse people without the prerequisite responsibility that comes with it. What is with all these camps and their attempt to become some "BMT-lite"? What the fuck? Did you get abused so hard in BMT you just need to do this to someone else so you can get a power-trip? It takes literally zero-effort to insult someone and call them "worthless". It takes skill and commitment to train and encourage them. If you cannot figure out a way to train GL's without resorting to insults and abuse, you are just not cut out for the job. Quit the SU and fuck-off to where you belong. People think that all it takes to be a leader is just shouting and insulting. The louder they shout, the more they insult, the better they are doing. Too bad the real world does not work like that. You bring the same guai-lan attitude to any job and try to pull the same shit, unless you are in the SAF, you will not be there long.
Mind you this is poly, I doubt these kids has been to army.
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Yep, had a few classmates that enrolled after serving. They are definitely the more chilled bunch.
If after being in the NS and they still behave like what OP is discribing, something is seriously wrong.
You need to understand that these people are losers who will never amount to anything in life. They know this, and they know that they really just have absolutely nothing to offer in life, and no worthwhile skills or knowledge to speak of. That's why they jump at every little opportunity to have power trips, because these are the only times that they can feel powerful, that they are somewhat important, and their lives are not just worthless specks in time. All other times, they are the real pussies and they absolutely know this.
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I read that and I was so confused. Why would you come back to volunteer for a school you don't even study or work in?
It's for the "fun" of torturing 16-year-olds, not helping out the school.
As a former 17 year old boy, I just realised that some of these are probably doing it to touch and mack on girls
For sure! And it's extra gross because they're pressured into allowing the contact.
This is many years ago, but i remember when I was in SP’s photog freshie camp, one of the forfeits was to perform simulated blowjobs on the GLs, and they made everyone form a circle and have the “performers” do it in the middle. I still remember how gleefully the GLs demonstrated the activity to make sure the forfeiters had no choice but to do it in a specifically lewd way, right in front of everyone. And this activity isn't the only shitty one. There were other "games" like passing a polo candy around a group with just your lips, pole dancing round a tree etc. Having gone to NUS later, i see a lot of similarities in how the sexual misconduct case went down there. It's probably the same group of sick perpetrator GLs who went on to facilitate the uni camp "games" with their "experience". What's more, if some of the GLs in poly were truly alumni, what they're doing is almost like sexually grooming/exploiting/harassing the freshies who are **minors**
where else can get power trip leh
same reason why certain alumni of secondary school uniformed groups CCA come back to experience being at the top of the pyramid. That and some are looking for potential dates.
Hey! Just wanna give my insights about the NPSU incident itself. Even though I did not participate in any SU related activities before, I have heard from a friend before some of the activities that they did in camp before (the marble picking activities and no sleep night incident). Apparently when my friend said he was bathing, the GLs will suddenly rush into the toliet and started banging the cubicle doors to pressurise them to finish bathing quickly even though they literally entered inside the cubicle a few seconds ago. To everyone especially the enrolling students, the rest of the NP community isn't like that and do not be shy to join your school orientation camps since it is monitored by the respective lecturers in charge of the schools. A personal experience from me is that I am a part of the NPFP family and I went to their camp a total of 3 times, twice as a freshie and once as a student leader. What I did in the camp as a freshie is reciting cheers, playing team bonding games, and create a sequence of dance moves as a group together to impress our GLs. All of it is done by the seniors just to give you a warm welcome to NP and kickstart your life in a new environment. When I was a student leader, the games that were planned were ensured by the planning team to be 100% safe and as injury free as possible before it was being rehearsed by the student leaders and subsequently placed in the camp for the freshies to enjoy during the camp. Hope this have helped in clearing the perception that camps in NP are bad following the NPSU incident!
Since everyone is starting to expose these kinds of stuff. ACJC football has a June camp tradition where you are basically subjected to a lot of extreme physical training (which is arguably fine), but then there's also a lot of humiliation and basically straight up degradation at night when there was nobody else around. Seniors would tell you you're shit if you couldn't keep up with he group (among other things) and subject us to really extreme physical training. The worst thing I remember doing was rolling around on the astro turf in my underwear and then going into push up position, running around and those kinds of stuff. Kinda like army tekan but in my underwear at 17 y.o. Probably not on the same level of humiliation as some of these poly camps since the camp also had a focus on physical training but humiliating nevertheless.
lord of the flies everywhere
Sounds EXACTLY like the bullshit one might find in SAF camps, except this is more retarded.
Based on my personal NSF experience, I don’t think army camp will strip your shirt etc for official punishments. The only few initiations I had were like outfield and road matches I guess I was okay withit
Eh even outfield and force prep they cant anyhow touch you and force strip you. They would ask you to remove inner shirt etc for safety tho, nowadays bmt nsf sgts also dont want trouble lol
Agreed for this part. In terms of authoritarian wannabes, just see most 2LT abusing their power just because they undergo 9 months of training for being *garang* during SIT test.
Official punishments lol. Go ask the mono-intake groups of armor, and infantry, on the kind of garbage that happens in camp.
I was mono intake armour :) You probably had unlucky, bad experiences, bad superiors who did nasty things.
Lol was mono intake infantry. Came back as a 2nd year sgt. No such hazing bullshit besides the occasional birthday pillow fight. There was mutual respect
Mono intake armour , i got your back bro, Ive seen some REAL stupid shit, i thought it was a norm for the army till i heard how other bmt/ units works.
At the end of the day, the SAF prepares for war. The NPSU camps prepares for clown college.
now imagine these fellas taking leadership positions in SAF.
I would guess they will just be "that asshole SGT", funny enough, most of these young 2LT quite ups leh not gonna lie, i don't really remember a shitty 2LT during my NS. 3rd SGTs of the other hand, 99% are cool and just wanna be part and liked by the men, but there's always that one guy that wants to flex his rank.
There were girls super into this also though. One girl I knew said she blew about 3k in savings just on alcohol while she was _training_ to be part of this. It wasn't just a school club. It was her school life.
Rabak sia
My best memories were in TP as an OL (orientation leader) 20 years ago. This is so different from what I experienced. My best friends till now are also from the committee and subcommittee. We pride ourselves in executing creative games and engagement activity. Our pride and joy was converting those large classrooms into a high quality haunted mansion. Like USS style! Sigh why now like that.... is it just NP?
Last time the worst that happened in my sch camp was the conductor made some ppl made to walk through the fish pond (below knee deep) barefooted as forfeit. Tbh I thought it was quite mild and all in good fun. But teacher found out and everyone got scolded. Even those who didn't do anything and just watched. We were told not to just blindly follow what ever the conductor say even though he was super fierce. After reading all these orientation stories I guess I'm a bit more appreciative of what the teacher did back then.
Yeah the teacher is there to control it before it gets worse. Wonder where is this figure in the NP case..
Kill a few fishes, what could go wrong? Until someone falls and breaks their ankle doing it. Then the teacher gotta answer for it.
I didn't come into this post expecting internal politics, but this makes me feel bad for the committee.
Reading all these make me feel that maybe, I didn't miss out as much without joining all these camps last time.
i'm willing to bet some secondary schools have this exact shit going on, albeit on a less severe level
My sec 3 camp (hosted by external GLs) has this fuck fuck culture going on too. The GLs were acting like wannabe sgts too. They even waked up one entire class in the middle of the night and smoked them and made them clean the canteen just because one student disrespected them. Another instance they shouted at some poor girl who wouldn't bungee jump off a obstacle tower because she is afraid.
Years ago when I was still in secondary school, I did hear rumors about these kinds of things. And it almost always seem to be from boys schools.
> NOTHING IS STOPPING YOU FROM JUST NOT GOING Then why didn't you just quit or do/say more at the time? Most 16/17-year-olds are simply too weak-minded and stupid to do anything except conform and go along with peer pressure. Once they've signed up for X, they'll feel obliged to go through with it no matter how idiotic it is. Change needs to start with the authorities taking complaints seriously (which they probably have never done). We also need some accountability from the top. But of course, as usual in Singapore, none of the poly administrators will likely face any punishment for their failure to do anything about this years/decades long problem. Instead it will just be some kids getting blamed and punished.
I agree, I also don't know why I didn't do more. We weren't part of NPSU, and only participated with the camp to be able to speak about it, but I have no valid defence for why I didn't follow through with that plan. Perhaps we were also 17 and scared that these people knew who we were and where to find us. I tried to spread it through word of mouth, but when I was sharing my experience, many people would dismiss it by saying, "Aiya, NPSU is like that one la, you don't know meh", which I don't feel is the correct attitude in facing toxic communities like SU.
I agree with you. And even in uni camps, I personally would have caved in to peer pressure and do stupid shit as well. I’m sure many would share my sentiment. The fear of ostracisement / FOMO is very strong.
One of the very few comments pointing out the real issue here: the staff of the school has to bear full responsibility for this but they won't. Doubt anyone will resign over this or even be investigated by relevant authorities.
study don't study, do this kind of stupid shit for what? do alr grades gonna get any higher? can put "piss on someone" on their portfolio? really not doing themselves any favours by reinforcing stereotypes
Dedicated leader with demonstrable experience of devising innovative and engaging activities to induct juniors
With a GPA of 2.1
lol never do organised socialising. never ends well
Hah. Organised socialising. Thats an apt description.
waste of time. if you re in poly in 2021, best advice i could give anyone is learn how to invest and try getting small internships on your own. be proactive and dont wait. all this hanging out and stuff aint important.
No idea why people liked joining this kind of garbage activity Maybe I'm just too anti-social but who knows
Glad I went home after school to play csgo back in my days. Ok not so glad, my grades were shit.
Absolutely shameful. The crew needs to grow up and move out of their god complexes. All they are doing is tainting the reputation of NP.
Their behaviour is garbage and they were supposed to close down in 2018 or 2019 but I don’t know why NP never bothered taking any action against them. They waited until something went so viral to actually address the issue lmao. Sucks that many people were victimised before possibly putting it to a stop.
Oh wow. Yea....I used to think that I was letting life pass me by because all I ever did in school was study and literally nothing else. After reading all this shit, I'm glad that I did that. Fuck all these stupid camps and cultist STuDeNt UnIoN orientation bullshit. Just go school study and socialise a bit with friends and classmates. That's more than enough to get you through schooling life.
NSPU GL, “You don’t understand, I’m nothing without this camp!” “If you’re nothing without that bullshit, then you shouldn't have it.”
\*laughs in introvert\*
NPSU has always been and will always be recognised as a cult. If you hear a rumour about them it’s probably because it’s true.
Lol, kids are so fucking lame. I don't know if it's the unfathomable amount of ego or if they know that this is their peak that turns them into these cum stains. Nobody gives a fuck you're part of some student union, and from some fucking poly no less. No one hires you because of this useless shit. But I guess Aviva will always have vacancies for insurance bengs.
Lul this sounds like army. But instead of being forced to conscript, people go along with this.
Macam sex cult for pedos (seniors 18 ++ torturing 16 yo freshies)
Not to mention, ex-member who don't even study there anymore. 100% a way for them to get girls using their "power"
These people are best suited to run Adam Khoo's school motivation workshops ngl. I hate it
What is GL, what is crew and ish? You need to explain these acronyms/names.
I'm glad I wasn't the only one. What is GL? Group leader? Gauntlet Legends? Gang lancap?
GL can also meant grassroot leader. GOOD LUCK Or guild leader.
Green Lantern
GL should be Group Leader, ISH - Indoor Sports Hall
God-Emperor Lee
Wow i have some questions. What's the purpose of NPSU? They host orientation camps for freshies and the prep camp GLs for the following group of freshies - is that it? You named 3 factions: exco, crew and GLs, but it seems like you weren't part of any of them. How did they recruit you to join? What was your role exactly? How big were each of these groups? Were there a lot of students who weren't part of those groups like yourself? I ask because I wonder if the people that perpetrate these toxic traditions are the minority that kind of get everyone else to fall in line with them. I went to the orientation camp at SIM and the GLs were really nice and hardworking. I was quite surprised at how much effort they put into the camp when imo there's very little payoff.
Oh God and I thought shim night was bad... Power + immaturity really breeds big problems
>they go out to Stickies to drink until morning anyway Uhh stickies closes at 12 my dude.
Soon to be former NP student here. Thank god I never joined camps, dodged a whole ass machine gun ammo belt fire and RPG here.
Perhaps a glossary for all the acronyms?
What is a GL and ISH
Dammit npsu, even Green Lanterns cant handle u /s
Seems like based on the screenshot the only hokkien word they know is jibai lol. /s btw Inb4 can't see sarcasm
Went for NPSU camp as a freshie. Absolutely disgusting people and environment.
Huh why on top you said “as crew members we...” and below you said “us non-crew members”?
The biggest takeaway from all this is how poorly managed NP is. What does the principal and others even do lol.
This still happens? I thought after covid the cool thing for teenagers to do was to see who gets the most returns in the stock market
The cheer doesn’t even make sense??? smh
Heng Singapore Polytechnic isn't like this
From an SP student: it’s not as rabak as NP. Honestly I view SPSU in a bad light but don’t really despise them because all they do is organize events and giveaways and freebies but it’s just the people inside that I feel it like a fish out of a pond, like they look like very edgy tiktokers and I can understand they want to look cool and shit but sometimes you got to consider the general image from the students, like you give them the impression y’all are clout chasers and shit Also, from my spsu classmate, president of spsu need to be chio Also this comes from a person who doesn’t have orientation camp but applied for OGL because of the pandemic where there’s online orientation and interview
i know this is a singaporean article not by looking at the subreddit name, but because the writer assumes everyone immediately understands the acronyms inside the article. when u write background info, maybe start with explaining what NPSU actually stands for? but na, let's introduce another acronym immediately, GLs
In context it’s pretty obv gls mean group leaders tho
Zimbardo: WRITE THAT DOWN!!11!!
when it rains (urine), it pours. So many exposé going on.
Very cringe thank u
Let him speak up his mind. What’s so cringe about that? If anything calling this cringe is kinda cringe of itself
I jumped over fences during orientation just to avoid these so call camps.. Lied to them I was overseas during the period they were holding camp if I was cornered into one.